Interesting Fact - Money

The next English £5, £10 and £20 banknotes will be printed on plastic.

(The fiver will be issued first in September 2016, followed by the tenner, which will be issued in 2017, but the £20 note will have to wait until 2020.

Their appearance will change too. Sir Winston Churchill will feature on the £5 banknote, replacing Elizabeth Fry, ​​Jane Austen will replace Charles Darwin on the £10 banknote, and artist J.M.W. Turner will feature on the £20 not, replacing economist Adam Smith. Nothing has been said about the £50 note, which features the engineers Matthew Boulton and James Watt.

Historical characters have only appeared on bank notes since 1970.  Other people depicted on previous notes have been:
  • Sir Edward Elgar (composer)
  • Michael Faraday (scientist)
  • Sir John Houblon (first Governor of the Bank of England)
  • Sir Isaac Newton (scientist)
  • Florence Nightingale (nursing)
  • William Shakespeare (poet/playwright)
  • George Stephenson (engineer)
  • 1st Duke of Wellington (general/statesman)
  • Sir Christopher Wren (architect)
The reason given for the change in materials used to print them is that polymer banknotes are cleaner, more secure, and more durable than the current paper/linen ones.

Well at least this is one piece of plastic people are less likely to throw away.)

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